2nd. If they did not borrow—if their art was indigenous—then it would come under the universal law of barbarian art; and painting would, at any rate in the earlier epochs, have been employed. (We know that both painting and dressing were employed in all epochs.)
This being so, and the custom being universal, unless the change from painted to unpainted statues had been very gradual, insensibly so, the man who first produced a marble statue without any addition would have been celebrated as an innovator. No such celebrity is known.
Ancient literature abounds with references and allusions to the practices of painting and dressing statues. Space prevents their being copiously cited here. Moreover, many of them are too vague for direct evidence. Of those which are unequivocal a few will be given.
Dressing Statues.—Pausanias describes a nympheum, where the women assembled to worship, containing figures of Bacchus, Ceres, and Proserpine, the heads of which alone were visible, the rest of the body being hidden by draperies. And this explains a passage in Tertullian (“De Jejun.,” 16), where he compares the goddesses to rich ladies having their attendants specially devoted to dress them—suas habebant ornatrices. For it must be borne in mind that the Greek idols, like the saints in Catholic cathedrals, were kept dressed and ornamented with religious care. Hence Homer frequently alludes to the offerings of garments made to propitiate a goddess; thus, to cite but one, Hector tells Hecuba to choose the most splendid peplos to offer to Minerva for her aid and favour. Dionysius, the Tyrant of Syracuse, according to a well known anecdote, stripped the Jupiter of his golden cloak, mockingly declaring that it was too heavy for summer, and too cold for winter.
“The golden cloak of the Sicilian Jupiter seems scarcely to illustrate the subject of dressing statues—as it was probably not drapery, not cloth enriched with gold—but solid, like the golden Ægis of the Minerva of Phidias, which could be removed and replaced.”—W. W. Lloyd.
These dressed statues were for the most part dolls, however large. The reader must remember that the dolls of his nursery are the lineal descendants of ancient idols. Each house had its lares or household gods; each house had its dressed idols. Statues, in our sense of the word, were, it may be supposed, not dressed; but that they were painted and ornamented there seems to be ample evidence.
Coloured Statues.—If we had no other evidence than is afforded in the great variety of materials employed—ivory, gold, ebony, silver, brass, bronze, amber, lead, iron, cedar, pear-tree, &c., it would suffice to indicate that the prejudice about “purity of marble” is a prejudice. The critic may declare that a severe taste repudiates all colour, all mingling of materials; but the Greek sculptors addressed the senses and tastes of the Greek nation, and did so with a view to religious effect, just as in Catholic cathedrals painted windows, pictures, and jewelled madonnas appeal to the senses of the populace.
The Greeks made statues of ivory and gold combined. They also combined various metals with a view of producing the effect of colour. One example will suffice here. Pliny tells us (lib. xxxiv. cap. 14) that the sculptor of the statue of Athamas, wishing to represent the blush of shame succeeding his murder of his son, made the head of a metal composed of copper and iron, the dissolution of the ferruginous material giving the surface a red glow—ut rubigine ejus per nitorem æris relucente, exprimeretur verecundiæ rubor. Twenty analogous examples of various metals employed for colouring purposes might be cited. Quatremère de Quincey, in his great work, “Le Jupiter Olympien,” has collected many.
The reader may, however, admit that statues were made of various materials, and that the bronze statues—which were incomparably more numerous than the marble, may have been tinted, but still feel disinclined to believe that the marble statues were ever painted. A few decisive passages shall be adduced.
Let it be remembered that Socrates was the son of a sculptor, and that Plato lived in Athens, acquainted with the great sculptors and their works; then read this passage, wherein Socrates employs, by way of simile, the practice of painting statues: “Just as if, when painting statues, a person should blame us for not placing the most beautiful colours on the most beautiful parts of the figure—inasmuch as the eyes, the most beautiful parts, were not painted purple, but black—we should answer him by saying, Clever fellow, do not suppose we are to paint eyes so beautifully that they should not appear to be eyes.” (Plato, “De Repub.” lib. iv., near the beginning.)